 |
| Yesterday's sunset over the Pacific Ocean: Phase I |
Which questions can I ask which help me to really reflect on the past year, those explorations that hold juice, integrity, real interest for the world and all beings? I’m not
very compelled by the questions that seek some measurement of what I have
gotten from the past year, but instead by those that search out what I have
contributed. This is a dance of wholeness, stepping away from self/other
dichotomies and into the less familiar territory of “we, all, us.” We do not
function, love, exist, die in isolation; we see how this notion has really wreaked
chaos. I am edging more toward a language of query that places self in a more
right-sized perspective.
 |
| Yesterday's sunset over the Pacific Ocean: Phase II |
How can I look at the past year in terms of offerings to others out of a fullness of self?
In what ways did I serve others through a movement toward compassion? In what ways was the world more open, whole, balanced, loving as I walked through it?
Still, these questions include "me."
 |
| Yesterday's sunset over the Pacific Ocean: Phase III |
But perhaps because compassion must necessarily involve everybody, without fragmentation, polarizations of self/other, I will not be able to eliminate “I” from the question. I have a part in the compassion-making; each of us does. So I must be able to ask a question that encourages myself to take responsibility for my part. One strong salient question that comes from the core, the heart. Where compassion lives.
 |
| Yesterday's sunset over the Pacific Ocean: Phase IV |
We each must do that to which we are called, for which we are culled. A stab at a question that aims toward being expansive enough; is from my depths; which places me in the center of all Life, not the center of my own small, disconnected life; and which calls me to service and compassion: that is the quality of reflective question I seek, explore, as this 2012 marker comes to a close. I know that questions are formed from words, which are simply symbols or pointers toward something. May we find the courage to live in the exploration, knowing that the only “answers” we can truly offer are those compassionate acts that sprout from the roots of our lighted souls.
 |
| Yesterday's sunset over the Pacific Ocean: Phase V |
All blog photographs taken by Jennifer J. Wilhoit unless otherwise noted.
